An upstart champion, a dramatic pennant race and the derailment of a potential dynasty were all a part of an exciting 1987 baseball season that included the following highlights… *How the Minnesota Twins used a potent lineup and a top-heavy pitching staff, led by Frank Viola and Bert Blyleven, to navigate their way to a […]
The Minnesota Twins and St. Louis Cardinals were teams built for their homefield. The Twins had power, well-suited to the hitter-friendly atmosphere at the Metrodome. The Cardinals, playing in what was then an artificial turf-covered Busch Stadium with deep dimensions, were constructed on speed. It’s appropriate that when these contrasting teams met in the 1987 […]
In the 21st century, the St. Louis Cardinals and San Francisco Giants are arguably baseball’s two pre-eminent franchises. They’ve combined for seven National League pennants and four World Series titles. On three occasions (2002, 2012 & 2014) they’ve gone head-to-head in the postseason. That wasn’t the case when they met in the 1987 NLCS and […]
The Minnesota Twins were an 85-win team, one of the worst to ever reach the League Championship Series round in 1987. The Detroit Tigers had the best record in baseball and were fresh off winning an epic divisional race against the second-best team, the Toronto Blue Jays. It’s natural that the Minnesota-Detroit matchup in the […]
The 1987 St. Louis Cardinals were a team with some amends to make. They were coming off a horrid run of a year plus ten innings. It went back to the 1985 World Series when, on the verge of a championship in Game 6, a bad umpire’s call triggered a ninth-inning collapse and they melted […]
The 1987 New York Mets came into the season feeling like a dynasty might be at hand. They had won an epic World Series title in 1986, the culmination of a three-year building program under manager Davey Johnson that included strong seasons in 1984 and 1985. They were both young and established and were widely […]
From 1985-92, the Toronto Blue Jays were defined by close-but-no-cigar and questions about whether they could take the final step and win a championship. There was a crushing ALCS loss in 1985 and subsequent playoff losses in 1989 and 1991. The 1987 Toronto Blue Jays fit squarely in that tradition, as one of the best […]
The 1987 Detroit Tigers were the last postseason team in the Hall of Fame career of manager Sparky Anderson. They produced the best record in baseball, won the AL East for the second time in four years and did with a dramatic final week push when they appeared all but dead. GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTSStart […]
Roger Craig was hired as the manager in San Francisco in 1986, inheriting a franchise that had just lost 100 games and had not won the NL West since 1971. Craig—who ironically had the same name as a great running back who also starred in San Francisco in this same time period—immediately turned the team […]
Editor’s Note: This is part of a series of sports history articles aimed at preserving the best moments of the modern sports era, from 1976 to the present. The focus is team sports—college & pro basketball and football, major league baseball and hockey. This article offers a snapshot of 1987 sports, a year that saw Bob Knight, Wayne Gretzky and Magic Johnson all return to championship form.